Make Your Way to the Manger

If you are planning a trip to Bethleham on Christmas Eve to say happy b-day to Jesus, you will most likely end up in Manger Square. Wikipedia - Manger Square is an important city square in the center of Bethlehem. It takes its name from the manger where Jesus is said to have been born which, according to Christian dogma, is in the Church of the Nativity, possibly the oldest existing church in the world, which surrounds the square. Also around Manger Square is the Mosque of Omar (the city's only mosque) and the Palestinian Peace Center. Streets with names connected to Jesus, including Star Street and Nativity Street, lead into the Square.

Excerpt From Single White Female BackpackerDecember 24, 2008. My Lonely Planet guide recommended a small boutique hotel called A Little House in Bakah. It seemed like a nice place to stay and was within walking distance of the old city of Jerusalem and a five minute drive to Bethlehem when I had planned to spend Christmas Eve. When I got to the hotel I was disappointed to learn they had no rooms available. I was so certain that this was the hotel I was meant to stay at that I just stood there in disbelief staring at the poor desk clerk who had delivered the bad news. Ten minutes later, perhaps to end the uncomfortable situation I had created by continuing to stand there, the desk clerk realized he did have an available room. Thank God because I had no idea where else to go and I wasn’t aware of any nearby mangers to crash in.

I checked in and took a nap thinking that if I was going to make it to midnight mass I would need to rest. As I drifted into dreamland, I reflected on the events of the past two months and it seemed surreal that I had started in Berlin and had actually made it to Jerusalem on Christmas Eve. I had often dreamed about visiting Bethlehem on Christmas Eve and now here I was. How cool is that? I was still exhausted after having spent a sleepless night in the cold Wadi Rum desert in Jordan the night before and I feared I was coming down with a cold – talk about bad timing. I wasn’t sure if would actually make it to Manger Square. My body wanted to spend Christmas Eve in bed. I awoke around 10:00 pm and tried to hire a cab to take me to Bethlehem and was stunned to discover the fare would cost $100 US. How could that be? According to my guidebook I was only 5-minutes away. I discovered that in order to enter the territory of Palestine, my driver would have to cross through the checkpoint at the other end of the city. This, combined with the fact that the weather was starting to turn nasty convinced me to go back to bed and visit Manger Square in the morning. I was sure Jesus would understand.

Before falling back to sleep, I carried my laptop into the lobby to update my Facebook status to Teresa is in Jerusalem...because that would make it official! I started chatting with two American women also in their 30’s on their way to midnight mass in Bethlehem. I explained how I started out with the same plan then decided to stay in after learning how much a cab ride cost. Then the obvious finally occurred to me. One hundred divided by three equals affordable. Perhaps this was Jesus’ way of personally ensuring I made it to his birthday party on time. Only Arab cab drivers were allowed into Palestine and lucky for us, our driver just happened to be Arab. Of course most of the cab drivers in Jerusalem seemed to be of Arab descent so the probability was pretty high. The traffic in Bethlehem was nuts with many of the main roads temporarily closed to allow the President, Salam Fayyad, to arrive at Manger Square in a timely and safe manner for his annual appearance at the church to wish the Christian population a Merry Christmas.

Our crafty driver told some guards that we were part of the presidential procession and, after asking four times, convinced them to let us pass though the barricade onto the empty street helping us arrive at our destination faster. He did this at a number of different checkpoints making me wonder if four was a magic number in Palestine. Was there a law stating that if a person asks four times you must grant their wish? When we arrived at Manger Square, the scene resembled more of a New Years Eve celebration than a Christmas Eve celebration. A large stage set up in the middle of the square hosted a number of different music acts playing popular dance music. The Christmas cocktail of partiers surrounding the stage consisted of 2 parts Muslim, 1 part Christian and 1 part who the heck knows? The souvenir stores that lined the square sold an assortment of rosaries, carved nativity scenes and a plethora of other religious memorabilia. The delicious smell of roasted corn filled the air as men stood in front of makeshift barbeque kitchens ensuring the crowd was well fed. Shortly after 11pm, the entertainment stopped and the square started to empty out. Midnight was fast approaching so I followed the crowd to the church where I soon found myself in a huge line-up eagerly hoping to get in. While shivering in the cold, I met a couple of newlyweds from American, on a whirlwind week-long honeymoon. They informed me that the tickets to get into the church cost $100 and needed to be purchased ahead of time in Jerusalem. Needless to say, the tickets had sold out a week prior and no one was about to give up their golden ticket – the religious equivalent to a seat in the final game of the Stanley Cup.It felt like I was waiting in line at a popular nightclub – take away the young 20-somethings with short skirts and big hair and replace them with a bunch of monks and nuns with robes and habits (good habits, not bad habits). During Christmas time, it seems like every Christian on earth makes a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Add to that a team of highly-trained Palestinian snipers on the roof and the party is underway. My new friends didn’t have tickets either and, like me, were hoping to sneak in. When we got near the front of the line, we asked a Palestinian Special Forces Policeman if he would let us in without a ticket and he replied, “Not likely”.

Christmas Eve Midnight Mass

A man lights candles in front of the Church of the Nativity

A group of people waiting to get into the Church of the Nativity

Kim kneels at the spot where Jesus was believed to be born

But if there was one thing I learned from the cab driver, it was the four-time rule. We continued to chat for the next hour and after asking him four times to let us in he was no longer able to refuse. He replied, “If you waited until after the President leaves, I’ll see what I can do. True to his word, shortly after the presidential entourage left the building, he brought us to the front door where ticket holders waited to get in. Despite the fact someone came out and announced they weren’t allowing anymore people inside the church, our friend told us to wait and he’d get us in. I watched as he asked the guards to let us through and sure enough, after his fourth request, they opened the door and ushered us in. A woman inside asked for our tickets so we replied, “It is okay, we don’t need them” and continued walking. Satisfied with our explanation, she never bothered to stop us. As we entered the crowded cathedral in the middle of midnight mass I could hardly believe I actually made it. Here I was, spending Christmas Eve in the house of God. Or was I? I wondered if God really favored the inside of a church over other possible earthly locations to hang his hat. If I were God, I would prefer to stay in a penthouse suite at the Burj Al-Arab in Dubai enjoying a million-dollar view of the ocean, or in a luxury resort-spa in Bora Bora waking up every morning to a breakfast of fresh fruit and a rub down by my own personal masseuse. The scene seemed more hectic than holy to me. I couldn’t understand why all these people would pay $100 to listen to a group of archbishops say a blessing over a plastic baby Jesus. And not even a blessing they could understand. The entire service was in Latin, a language that, although it makes up the roots of most English, French, Italian and Spanish words, has not been commonly spoken for hundreds of years. But who am I to judge? Although I was raised Catholic, religion has never made sense to me. Was this really what God had in mind when he sent his son to the Earth? Of course it was! He is God - all knowing and all powerful. In fact he will probably strike me down with a bolt of lightning for ever doubting the Catholic Church or any church for that matter. I started to wonder if God was really an old man with a white beard (similar to Santa Claus) presiding over the Earth from his heavenly throne and determining who’s been naughty and who’s been nice? I realize that religion is supposed to make us better people and fill us with a sense of inner peace but I can’t help thinking that it separates the world more than it brings us together - the fact that I had to take a 40 minute cab ride to the Palestine Checkpoint when my hotel, under normal circumstances, was only a five minute drive from Bethlehem is a testament to that. Not to say that religion is not the path to enlightenment, it’s just not mine. After 10-minutes of questioning the validity of the very event I traveled so far to witness, I started to feel guilty so I left in order to make room for any true believers who were still standing outside waiting to get in. My new friends and I then went to a different part of the complex and stood in another line-up hoping to gain entrance into the Church of the Nativity – a chapel commissioned by Roman Emperor Constantine 300 years after the birth of Jesus to mark what is believed to be the exact location where Jesus was born. It took over an hour but by 3 am we finally entered the tiny crowded church and there I was …awake in the manger. The low ceiling of the modest church supported a number of candle-lamps and the red walls hosted a collection of paintings depicting the life of Jesus. While I stood in yet another line-up (for what I was yet to discover) a congregation of Nigerian nuns entered the room. Their blue and white flannel veils resembled the sheets on my grandma’s bed – I was so exhausted I just wanted to curl up on the tops of their heads and take a nap. Barely able to keep my eyes open I patiently waited until I reached the front of the line. It didn’t hit me until I found myself kneeling under an altar in front of a brass sun riveted to the floor how significant this moment was. It was Christmas Day and I was kneeling at the spot where Jesus entered the world. I placed my hand on the sun and said to the son of God, “I have traveled many miles to attend your party and I just wanted to say I love you and happy birthday. Oh…and thanks for the cheap cab ride!

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